


loves company

by ifreet



Category: due South
Genre: F/M, potential Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-09
Updated: 2010-05-09
Packaged: 2017-10-12 09:50:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/123581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ifreet/pseuds/ifreet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Warnings: Note the pairing and know that my 'save as' title was VictoriaSexViolence. I did not use the archive warnings due to a potential character death -- ticky boxes are not designed for ambiguity!</p>
            </blockquote>





	loves company

The haircut took more of an adjustment than she had expected. Victoria had found herself brushing away phantom curls and shaking absent locks out of her way for several days afterward, and she was glad she'd altered it as early as she had. The lightened color caught her eye in mirrors at first, too, but the 'stranger' caught out of the corner of her eye stopped visibly startling her within a few hours. The gestures, the infuriatingly ingrained habits, took longer, but now they, too, have been wiped out. Her hands and her head were under conscious control again -- arguably more so than they'd been previously.

Victoria sat at a table and waited. She'd collected Jolly in much the same way, a partner just smart enough to be useful and not ambitious enough to get in her way. She preferred to let her marks come to her... after choosing them, after doing the necessary research and setting everything up so they'd think it'd been their idea all along.

She hadn't had to wait long before he came in, alone as expected. He never brought anyone to the bar; if something had happened to free up his partner, they'd have gone elsewhere, and she would have waited for the next opportunity. But he was here, and she had a number of small emergencies he could rescue her from, if he didn't approach her on his own.

He didn't, seeming content to drink quietly at the bar. After a moment's consideration, she decided on the trip. Easy to manage, with the bonus of physical contact. Cliche approaches became classic for a reason.

She walked towards his stool, caught his eye in the mirror with a small smile that she hid quickly as though shy. She stumbled as she passed him, making a startled sound, and he caught her. She stayed pressed up against him a little too long, a little too obviously, and he smiled at her. She'd seen that smile before, though it had directed at someone else when it'd been captured by a news crew. She crushed her natural reaction and smiled back at him.

***

His mobile phone rang beside her purse, and she nearly laughed for the timing. "Ignore it," she suggested, smiling, hitching her hips. His handcuffed hand clutched at the air.

"God," he groaned and grabbed at her hip with his free hand. He shook his head. "Could be important." He released her and flailed towards the phone on the nightstand, but couldn't quite reach it.

She pulled a face at him, made another small fucking motion. "Just, just check the id," he gasped out.

As she'd hoped, she knew the number. She pulled her gun as she answered.

"Wha-"

"Hello, Ben." She wedged the phone between ear and shoulder, fired, muffling the shot with a pillow. Ben would still hear. The man jerked beneath her, inside her, a surprising jolt of pleasure. She watched as shock chased the confusion from his face, and her voice as she spoke to Ben was as calm and matter of fact as she'd planned from the moment she'd first seen him smiling at his new partner on the news. "I've shot your dog again. Do you think you'll find this one in time?" She dropped the phone without disconnecting. She could hear Ben's voice faint and tinny from where it fell, saying her name and, irritatingly, his.

She slid off him. He groaned, body curving around the injury as best he could, like any wounded animal. She dressed quickly and wiped the nightstand for prints, tucked the trash in her purse to take with her -- not to hide her identity, which Ben had thoroughly re-established, but solely because the missing evidence would piss him off. She'd left her prints on Ben's partner anyway.

"You'll want to keep pressure on that." Victoria nodded at the wound as she let herself out. It might not be fatal; there was a chance Ben could save him. She always tried to give Ben a chance.


End file.
